Re: W3C Invitation

[Paul Hoffman / IMC <phoffman@xxxxxxx>]

A few short notes on the advantages proposed by the W3C for putting 
the Atom work in the W3C.

> - Strong promotion and deployment

Atom hasn't needed any promotion to date; it is being adopted well 
even before being stable (<sigh>). Other W3C technologies have needed 
promotion, but it is unlikely Atom needs any. It is not clear how the 
W3C can help deployment.

> - Open participation and consensus

Er, these two are generally more associated with the IETF. The 
capability for them in the W3C is already being actively discussed on 
the mailing list.

> - W3C Patent Policy: Royalty Free licensing

See <http://www.ietf.org/ipr.html> for the IETF's policy. And let's 
not turn this into a forum of armchair lawyers arguing which of the 
two patent policies are "better" or "more likely to be enforceable". 
Basically, both groups have policies which hope to prevent people 
from screwing the public by applying for patents that will restrict 
the deployment of the protocol.

> - I18n, Accessibility, Device Independence Support and Coordination
> - XHTML Cooperation
> - XML and RDF experience

Hopefully, these topics will be dealt with in Atom regardless of 
whichever body works on the standard. Having Atom in the W3C doesn't 
guarantee that the relevant W3C groups will help in a timely fashion; 
the same is true for the expertise in these areas in the IETF. Given 
the openness of the IETF process, folks who care about XHTML, RDF, 
and so on can all help if it is in the IETF.

> -  QA support

Not at all sure what this means.

--Paul Hoffman, Director
--Internet Mail Consortium